MHS Musings: Summer Not All Fun and Games

While many high school students are relaxing with family and friends this summer at the beach or on a faraway vacation, summer for students at Millburn High School isn't entirely about fun and games.

Some students are spending the summer at the nation's top colleges taking classes for high school or college credit to simply get ahead in high school or to learn something completely new and interesting: from leadership to international politics to game theory to computer programming.

With the PSAT coming up in October and the SAT and ACT given at various times throughout the school year, students are spending large portions of their summer preparing for these critically important tests. It includes working with a tutor or digging their heads into Kaplan and Princeton Review practice books.

Rising seniors also have an incredibly important task to complete this summer: begin preparing their college applications and resumes and writing essays for the schools they plan to apply for. This long process will continue into the fall and winter.

Plenty of students, especially juniors and seniors, are spending time this summer traveling the nation with their families visiting universities they may be interested in attending.

Many students also spend their summers attending programs and conservatories in which they can hone their special skills and talents, from lacrosse camp to photography camp to debate camp to performing arts intensives like the Paper Mill's Summer Conservatory, which I participated in for the first five weeks of my summer.

And then there's the always-dreaded summer homework.

Some students may only have summer reading to complete this summer, but students who have enrolled in Advanced Placement classes have a very large amount of work to complete for each class they plan to take.

For example, in AP Biology, a class that I've signed up to take this year, we're expected to read and master the first six chapters of our text (for a test during the first full week of school), answer over 100 short-answer questions and a few essays, and complete an online laboratory simulation. And that's just for one class.

Those students planning on taking four or five AP classes this year will find they have an overwhelming amount of work to do this summer, whether completing a detailed sketchbook for AP Studio Art, reading four classic novels for AP English Literature or beginning complicated coursework for AP Physics.

Students that are part of the school's award-winning Science Research program, a three-year rigorous research class, spend the summer intensely working on the research they've begun during the year, traveling to laboratories and mentors near and far.

Reading isn't just an important summer activity to young children. The English Department gives summer reading assignments to every student entering sixth grade through 12th. At the high school level for English 9, American Literature and British Literature, students are asked to read two selections relevant to the themes to be explored in class and to respond to the readings through paragraph writing and quotation lists.

For AP English Language, students must read three required books and complete journal assignments for each. In AP English Literature, students are required to read four major texts and five poems, and respond to each in detailed journal assignments.

A brief 30 minutes away, Montclair High School does not give any summer homework—not even summer reading. Although summer homework is painful and frustrating at times, I'm still grateful that Millburn High School gives it. Without summer reading assignments, many students will have gone without reading or writing for 10 weeks, which will undoubtedly make English classes in September very difficult for some.

I also think it's essential for AP students to get ahead before classes begin in September.  Because AP exams are distributed in May, AP classes have virtually only 110 school days to accomplish what other high school and college students accomplish in an entire year. The summer is therefore a great time to allow students to be introduced to the core themes of the class since a massive course curriculum must be accomplished in not a very long time. Summer also gives AP students the time to explore aspects of the class on their own and get ahead.

And what about me? I'm currently sitting on a beautiful porch on a sunny day with a great view of the Atlantic in Ventnor City… with my 75-page summer packet for AP Music Theory and novel (Ehrenreich's Nickel and Dimed) for American Literature by my side.

I have a feeling I'll still be finishing my hundred-plus hours of summer homework during the very last days of summer. Time for me to go back to work.